Meanjin 84.3 Spring 2025

How robust is Australian democracy?Fifty yearsago, anelected government wasabruptlydismissed by a governor-generalwhose reasons, methods and secret correspondenceshave never been made clear to the Australian public. This season we turn to the culturalandpolitical impactsof 11 November 1975thatcontinue to shape contemporary Australia.Tom McIlroy speaks to the remaining living journalists who covered the event.Njamalmanand Indigenous jurisprudence scholarTyson Holloway-Clarklooks at Pine Gap the joint Australia-US military base placed on nuclear alert during Whitlam's prime ministership without him or the Australian Government being informed from a First Nations perspective. VirginiaHausseggertracks fifty years of political misogyny sincethe Whitlam Government appointed the world's first Women's Adviser to a national government and introduced Australia's first Racial Discrimiation Act. Ben Eltham assess Whitlam's arts and cultural legacy. Constitutional expert Anne Twomey touches on some of the constitutional sleepers thatthat threaten to undermine our democracyif tested. Compelling reading alongside fine poetry, fiction, memoir and review pieces makes this an historic edition of Australia's leading literary journal that noMeanjincollection can be without.Embrace Australia's finest writers:Meanjin84.3 Spring2025 outWednesday 17 September.